


Nobody Expects the Spanish Inquisition

by skidmo



Category: Sanctuary (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-20
Updated: 2011-11-20
Packaged: 2017-10-26 07:50:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/280567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skidmo/pseuds/skidmo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-Sleepers. The thing he misses most is...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nobody Expects the Spanish Inquisition

**Author's Note:**

> Written for myfairjenni for the Sanctuary Secret Santa exchange on LJ.

The thing he misses most, apart from the immortality, of course, who wouldn't miss the immortality most? What kind of idiot would you have to be not to think, “Living forever? Never being ill? Never aging? Yes, please”?

And the claws. The claws came in so handy, and not just for ridiculous, little things like opening the mail. People tended not to disturb you when they knew you could eviscerate them with a touch.

The heightened senses were excellent as well, though he had to admit the scent thing got a little odious. No one really needed to not only hear their next door neighbors having sex for three days straight but have to smell the aftermath as well.

All right, so _one_ of the things he missed most was the electricity.

Having been fascinated by it from a very young age and having spent nearly his entire life working with it, not having it quite literally at his fingertips any longer was so...limiting.

Not to mention all the fun he'd had with it. There were few things he'd found in his considerably long life that were as satisfying as walking through a metal detector and having it go haywire just from your presence. (The resulting pat downs were usually quite enjoyable as well. He'd gotten not a few dates with unsuspecting security guards that way.)

The most fun, of course, was in surprising someone with it when it was least expected. Even those who knew what he was tended to jump a bit when he trailed a barely charged finger along the sensitive skin inside their elbow or let his lips tingle just a bit as he kissed them.

He liked that. He liked keeping people on their toes, reminding them that no matter how well they knew him, he always had something he was holding back, something unexpected. No one knew him so well that he could no longer shock them with something or other.

Well, almost no one.

***

Boredom. That's the thing he himself is surprised by now. He hadn't thought being ordinary could be so incredibly boring, what with the impending death sentence to keep you savoring each moment or whatever it was poets had to say about mortality.

And when he's bored, he gets into trouble. Usually spectacular trouble, but on this particular occasion, his method of relieving his boredom takes the fairly innocuous form of rifling through Helen's things. He's only looking for a diary of some sort, something he can tease her with, something to give him a better idea of what she really thinks of the changes in him. (He knows they're more than physical. He's not so oblivious to such things that he's unaware of the differences in the way he carries himself, the way he speaks to others.)

He's shifting around the papers in her bedside table when he finds it, tucked into a drawer with the sort of electric devices he'd been amused but not surprised to find kept close to Helen's bed.

He turns it over between his fingertips almost reverently, torn between gratification and confusion.

But this? This is so much better than a diary.

***

He's waiting for her when she comes to bed that night, and though she startles slightly at the sight of him reclining casually in her bed, he can see she's not really surprised. He's been staying in the Sanctuary for weeks now, after all. Sooner or later he was bound to try something like this.

Before she can berate him though, before she can ask him what the hell he thinks he's doing in her room, he pre-empts her with an amused, “Why on earth do you keep a violet wand in your nightstand?”

She flushes, which he hadn't expected. Helen is always perfectly collected, except when her life is in danger or she's yelling at him. It isn't like her to be embarrassed about something like this. It isn't as though he hasn't seen her naked. Several times, in fact, though none recently.

“I,” she begins, then gathers herself, her expression darkening, though he can't help thinking there's not quite the anger behind it that she hopes he'll see. “Have you been snooping around my bedroom?”

“Obviously,” he answers, not to be distracted by her assumed ire. That flush is far too intriguing to let slide. He turns the device in his hand, smirking at it now, having a better idea of what it was doing in that drawer even if he isn't exactly sure why. “Now, what use could you possibly have for such a thing next to...” His smirk deepens into a truly wicked smile. “Well, I don't use them often myself, but I can only assume that was a vibrator.”

“Don't change the subject,” she tries, still attempting to look indignant.

“I'm not the one changing the subject,” he reminds her.

She sighs then, almost deflating, and he knows he's about to be privy to one of the rare moments she lets her guard down and allows herself to be completely honest. (Rare for him, of course, though he suspects she was this way more often with James, or even Druitt.)

“If you must know,” she says, perching lightly on the bed across from him, “your recent change has got me...nostalgic.”

He arches an eyebrow, silently urging her to continue.

“I know it's been some time, Nikola, but you can't think I've forgot your particular talents. And now that you can't...”

Ah. That's it then. A replacement for him now that he's defective. Portable and less likely to talk back.

“I see,” he says, and suddenly he misses the electricity most of all. More even than the immortality.

“Nikola,” she says in that rare, patient tone, sliding just a bit closer to him. “I did miss you, you know, when you disappeared. So I know from experience that this little trifle,” she plucks it from his hand, “is hardly a suitable substitute.”

The veiled admission is enough to make him smile again, that stroke to his ego bringing a smile back to his face. Picking up the wand, he turns his grin in her direction. “Perhaps you simply weren't using it properly.”

Her laughter rings in his all-too-human ears as he takes the opportunity to kiss her, artfully maneuvering her onto her back on the mattress as he flips the switch to turn it on.

It's his invention after all. That makes it almost like having been in her bed all this time.

And it will be good to have electricity at his fingertips again.

 

 _fin_


End file.
